Over the past few weeks, I’ve published a number of historical records that seem to indicate that some of the discussions concerning  the historical pedigree of the term ‘transgender’ aren’t 100% accurate. Another thing that I’ve discovered recently is that the drama surrounding our terminology within the trans community seems to be nothing new. Consider the following piece from a trans magazine dated about 30 years ago:

‘Transvestite/Transsexual (TV/TS) Community’ includes everyone who identifies with any of the following words: ‘transvestite’, ‘cross-dresser’, ‘transgender’, ‘transsexual’, ‘drag queen’, ‘femiphile’, or ‘androgyne’. It is an identifiable group of people within society as a whole.

Because of the great amounts of heartburn some people have with the word ‘transvestite’, there is a movement afoot to replace ‘TV/TS’ with ‘CD/TS/AN’. Even though ‘CD/TS/AN’ applies to exactly the same group as ‘TV/TS’, a number of semantics zealots seem to think some great problem will be solves. Who knows – if enough people figure out what ‘CD’ and ‘AN’ mean, they may be right. Of course, if ‘CD’ means the act of cross-dressing and includes anyone who cross-dresses for whatever reasons, then ‘TS’ and ‘AN’ would be redundant. Then again, if ‘CD’ alone is unacceptable, and ‘CD/TS/AN’ is better that ‘TV/TS’, wouldn’t ‘TV/CD/TG/TS/QD/FP/AN’ be better still? Personally, I think ‘TV/TS Community’ is sufficient.

The revolt against the word ‘transvestite’ has increased the popularity of the word ‘paraculture’. ‘Para-‘ mean ‘beside’, or ‘along side of’, implying that ‘paraculture’ is another culture, parallel to or along side of culture – a culture within a culture.

Most people who use this word ‘paraculture’, use it to replace ‘TV/TS Community’. Other people use it to describe not only the TV/TS Community, but the TV/TS Community as it spills out into society as a whole, engulfing helping professionals directly affected by the Community.

(****Footnote: I believe the word ‘paraculture’ creates more problems that it solves. Very few people know what the word is intended to mean, or how to use it. Most listeners will simply take the word out of context and make up their own definitions. The word is inevitably misunderstood or in need of additional explanation. Some people, myself included, find the word pompous, offensive and unnecessary.)

– The TV/TS Tapestry, 1984

How does this article reflect aspects of the current discussion occurring in the community concerning the use of terminology? Personally, I see shades of some of the various arguments used from both sides of the current ‘transgender’ debate reflected in this article.  I find it interesting that history shows that the term ‘transvestite’ was indeed abandoned for the term ‘crossdresser’. Just as interesting to me is that this historical record seems to be touch on a time in our history in which we were hunting for a single term with which to describe ourselves as a community. Obviously ‘paraculture’ was abandoned for ‘transgender’ (note: the TV/TS Tapestry was later renamed the Transgender Tapestry) while ‘androgyne’ and ‘femiphile’ were largely abandoned all together.

This article was written 27 years ago. I am fairly certain that 27 years from now in the year 2038 we’ll still be wrestling with terms. I know a number of us can really get worked up over this issue, but it may be good to remember… don’t panic; we’ve been here before.